


Sacrifice

by joufancyhuh



Series: Elvhen Glory [4]
Category: Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Discussion over the sacrifice option, F/M, Minor Cousland/Alistair, Zevran speaks Italian
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-04
Updated: 2018-08-04
Packaged: 2019-06-21 13:26:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,545
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15558720
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/joufancyhuh/pseuds/joufancyhuh
Summary: Zevran overhears Morrigan's offer to Tabris.





	Sacrifice

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: Shut Up & Kiss Me
> 
> But honestly, those words just kind of appeared in there? I wrote this cause I wanted to figure out if Erenya lived or died at the end, cause she was dead set on dying when I created her. I tink I'm having trouble angsting in the DA-verse is what I think the real problem is.

“Erenya.”

Zevran sits on the bed with his legs crossed, a solemn expression twisting his lips down into a scowl. His eyes follow her to the corner of the room, where she unclasps her breastplate, letting it clink to the floor by her feet. The brisk air that seeps through the cracks of Arl Eamon’s castle hits her sweat-soaked undershirt, thrilling goosebumps over the freckles on her skin. She dares to not glance in his direction, scared of what she might find alight in his gaze.

He says only her name, but she knows that he knows, the evenness in his tone giving his eavesdropping away.

“You overheard us.” She matches his tone with her own calloused tongue, using it to cover her fear of his judgements. Her fingers release the last buckle on her bracer, the last piece of the upper half of her armor. She stays in the corner to work on the lower, allowing a few extra minutes to avoid him.

He knows what Morrigan offered her. Would she have told him otherwise? No, she imagines not, her stubborn determination unaccepting of any deviations to her plan. And he would want her to deviate, because he cared about her. If the situation reversed, she pretends she’d let him choose for himself while she supported him.

“And yet, I cannot help but notice how you have return _here_ , not the room where our templar friend sleeps.” If he holds any judgement for her decision, he keeps it to himself, buried how the Crows taught him.

It is then that she turns, his eyes aglow with the light of the hearth, reflecting only the orange and yellow that burns behind him. The fire creates a mask with him unreadable beneath it.

She plops down beside him on the bed to remove her boots; an hand on her arm halts her progress. Her gaze trains on her feet as she freezes under the touch, how gentle. It leaves her close to tears, the tenderness with which he moves her legs over his knees so that he can untie her boots himself. She watches him work on the laces, unknotting and drawing out laces to slip her foot out. Her toes wiggle out of habit as the first boot falls off his lap and onto the floor.

“Do you hate me for it?” Her eyes flicker up to his face, though his hair hangs like a curtain that shield half of it from her gaze. She reaches over to tuck a few pieces behind his ear. Her fingers linger on his face, tracing down his jaw until she get to his chin. She grabs it, turning his face toward hers to search for the answer to her question.

“Pepe.” There’s a rawness to his voice when he says his pet name for her, one that shines bright in his eyes. His hand releases on her remaining boot to cup the back of her head, forcing her forward so that his lips caress the center of her forehead. “ _Perch_ _é_ ,” he whispers into her skin. “I want to know why you are so willing to sacrifice your life when the option exists to save it.”

She draws back, out of his grasp. Her eyes retrain on her feet in his lap, her hands twisting themselves in her lap. “It’s my life to do with what I wish, my choice. It has nothing to do with you.”

His hand tilts her chin up this time so that their eyes meet once more. “Yet you cannot look me in the face to tell me your reply.”

She stood so tall during the meeting with Riordan, so assured with Morrigan while she turned down the offer. But alone with Zevran, she knows that hiding her truth from him is foolish. Her lover’s keen senses never grant her rest, his perception sharp when it comes to what bothers her.

“You wouldn’t understand.” She forces his hand away, turning her face to the hearth. Flames dance to ebb out the cold, but she shivers anyway.

“But see, you have not said anything to understand.” His hands cup hers that twist still, prying them apart to bring to his lips. “It is unlike you to play coy, Pepe.”

Her attentions dart from the fire back to him. Right, he is always right and she is always transparent in a way she wishes not to be. “Before I left the Alienage, there were these two children. They were pretending to be heroes and I asked them why-” She swallows the lump that forms in her throat as she recalls the tiny elves with big eyes, how confused they grew when she suggested they play as their own kind instead of humans. The bitter anger that rose in her, how this, too, the shemlens stole from her people. “-why they chose shem heroes. They said they didn’t know any elven ones.” Zevran’s grip on her hands tighten, as though anticipating her next words, the ones she swore to herself but never admitted to anyone. “I want to be that hero. Our people need that inspiration to lift themselves up, to reclaim our greatness.”

“You are already such a hero, _mi amore_.”

She huffs, her face scrunching up with distaste. The sentiment, while appreciated, falls short. “It sounds stupid, I know. But if I’m alive, the shems will stop at nothing to taint everything I’ve accomplished here, all the good I’ve done. It’s their way.”

“Not stupid.” He cards a hand through her hair. “Never stupid.”

“I want to help our people. I decided this long before you were in the picture.”

“Let me say this, and then I will go quietly with your plan.” He waits for her nod of agreement, which she gives with some reluctance. His attentions focus back on unknotting her boot while he speaks. “There is much more work to be done, work that can be accomplished by you staying alive.” The boot slips off with ease to join its sibling on the floor.

Zevran wastes no time in then tugging her into his lap. Her legs hook around his waist as he stands to ay her on her back across the mattress. His hands in her hair, he leans in close, his weight sinking her down into the featherbed. “My reasons for keeping you alive, however, are entirely selfish, _mi amore pepe._ This old Crow would miss you greatly.” He brings himself to smile, fake as it is. “But ah, I have wasted enough of your time. Let us commence with the getting naked, shall we?”

He goes slow that night, as if attempting to memorize each inch of her body; guilt seeds itself into her gut as she realizes it. How she could bring him to love her when she only planned to leave him on his own?

When his chest lumbers with sleep, she considers his words. The alienages still exist, as do the hopeless. Is it more important to be remembered for the good, or to do more good at the cost of her reputation? She wishes for the certainty she had earlier in the year, to see this through with blood.

Zevran sleeps on her chest, worry still in the deep lines of his brow. She tries to imagine life without him and discovers that she can’t, not without tears welling in her eyes, a sense of despair accompanying them. It’s unfair to ask this of him, to lie with him and pretend like she won’t die in two week’s time.

She slips out from under him to throw on a robe, unclothed feet padding out of their room and down the hall. Morrigan sits with her back to the door as Erenya lets herself in.

“Come to change your mind?”

Erenya draws in a deep breath. Everything she has worked toward, threatened by a pretty elf with tender eyes and a sun-lit smile. She accepted death when she was a child, but for once, he brings out the will to live in her, to keep going and keep fighting for their people. A living example of elven glory.

“I accept your terms. I’ll speak with Alistair and get him to agree.”

“Good.” Morrigan closes the book in her hand and half-turns toward Erenya. “Try not to appear so grim. This saves your life, after all.” No mention of Alistair’s life, but they both know that the future King wouldn’t sacrifice himself for a mere elf. Still so far to go, exactly like Zevran said.

When Erenya gets to the room that Alistair and Idrina occupy, Idrina agrees to the ritual first, much to Erenya’s surprise. She steps forward to convince Alistair, allowing Erenya to slip away, back to the cool dark of her own room. Zevran’s hands reach for her as she crawls back into bed.

“ _Grazie, mi amore_ ,” he whispers as he enfolds her.

She grins as she snuggles into his warm embrace. The doubt still exists over if she made the right decision, but in this instance with her lover locking her into his arms as though scared to lose her all over again, it feels right. “Shut up and kiss me,” she replies, an order Zevran is more than happy to fulfill.


End file.
